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The SETI Slayers | Fanfic
| Seeing Red | Two to Go |
An ambulance pulls to a stop in front of the Summers house, and the paramedics get out and start unloading their gear from the back. Xander comes running around the house with a cordless phone in hand, and calls for them to follow him into the back yard. His hands and shirt have blood on them.
The paramedics follow Xander around the house. “She was shot?” asks the first one.
“Yeah, in the chest,” says Xander.
“Accidental?” asks the second paramedic.
“No, no, uh—” says Xander. “It was a— He was trying to kill her.”
Buffy is lying on the ground, where she fell after Warren shot her.
Willow cradles Tara’s lifeless body in her arms, and cries. “Oh, god! Oh, no… Please! Please, come on! Come on, Tara! Please, come on, baby!” Tara’s blood is splattered across Willow’s face, and blouse.
The room darkens. Grey clouds form below the ceiling. Willow looks up, her eyes turning black. “By Osiris…I command you, bring her back!”
Xander hovers over the paramedics working on Buffy. She’s still lying on her back, struggling to breathe. Her eyes are open, and she blinks, but she doesn’t seem to see anything. The paramedics tell Xander to back off a bit to give them room to work.
“Hear me, Keeper of Darkness!” calls out Willow.
The face of a demon appears in the clouds. “Witch! How dare you invoke Osiris in this task.”
“Please…please bring her back,” pleads Willow.
“You may not violate the laws of natural passing.”
“How?” asks Willow. “How is this natural?”
“It is a human death by human means. You raised one killed by mystical forces. This is not the same. She is taken by natural order. It is done.”
“No! There has to be a way!”
“It … Is … Done!”
“Noooo!” Willow’s scream rends the air. The demon screams in pain, and vanishes.
The paramedics carry Buffy’s gurney around the house. One of them radios ahead to the hospital to tell them they’re bringing in a gunshot victim.
Xander is carrying Buffy’s IV bag. “Come on, Buff, hang on. We’re going to get you to the hospital.” He sees Willow coming out of the front door. She still has Tara’s blood splattered across her face, and blouse. “Willow, my god, are you okay?”
One of the paramedics takes the IV bag away from Xander as they take Buffy to load her into the ambulance.
Willow sees Buffy. “How did this happen?”
“Warren,” says Xander. “He had a gun.”
“Warren!” Willow starts down the front walk.
“It went down too fast. I couldn’t stop it,” says Xander. He’s surprised when Willow turns and walks quickly away down the street. “Hey! Will!”
The paramedics have loaded Buffy into the ambulance. They tell Xander that he has to come now if he wants to come with them.
Xander takes a last look at the departing Willow as he climbs into the back of the ambulance with Buffy.
Andrew lies on the top bunk in the cell he’s sharing with Jonathan. He’s hoping that they’ll let his aunt bring him his discman.
Jonathan is leaning against the bars of their cell. He thinks that in-flight entertainment is the least of their worries. They’re in jail, and he thinks the guy in the next cell wants to make him his butt monkey.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” says Andrew. “I heard him talking to the guard. He’s in here for parking tickets.”
Jonathan doesn’t think that matters. “The joint changes you. I hear they like the small ones with little hands like their girlfriends.”
Andrew tells Jonathan to calm down. This is more like the Mayberry jail than Oz. “Besides, Warren is going to find a way to get us out of here.”
Jonathan thinks that’s highly unlikely. “Nobody’s coming to get us, Not even your aunt who wouldn’t return your one phone call!”
“She must be out of town!” says Andrew.
“She…doesn’t…care,” says Jonathan. “And neither does your partner in crime Warren.”
Andrew doesn’t want to believe that Warren is going to abandon them. “What do you mean ‘my partner in crime?’ We’re in this together.”
“What do you mean ‘what do I mean?’” asks Jonathan. “You two were totally going to fly off and leave me holding the bag.”
“We weren’t,” says Andrew. “I was going to…carry you.”
“No! You two were setting me up, and then Warren was going to screw you over, too.”
“That is so not true!”
“Sure.” Jonathan’s voice drips sarcasm. “He’s a nice murderer. He keeps his word.”
“You’re wrong. He’s coming for us. He’s out there right now devising a brilliant way to get us out of here.”
Warren comes down the stairs into a dimly lit demon bar. He’s all dressed up, and wearing his cool shades. He orders himself a whiskey, and a round for the house. He sits down at the bar beside a vampire and tosses a hundred dollar bill at the bartender. He looks at the vampire. “Hey, bet you don’t get a lot of humans in—”
The vampires snarls at him. “I’m watching my program.” The TV behind the bar is tuned to a channel showing an alligator eating something.
“Wouldn’t want to interrupt your me time,” says Warren. “Not even to buy the guy who killed the Slayer a drink.” That gets the attention of everyone in the bar. “I took her out myself. I’ve been heading an organization…the Trio. You’ve heard of us.”
“Uh… No,” says the vampire.
“Not important. I cut them loose,” says Warren. Now that Buffy is out of the way, he figures he can get himself a real gang.
“And you killed the Slayer?” asks the bartender.
Warren sips his drink. “With these hands.”
“What are you, a warlock?” asks the bartender.
Warren says no. He tried witchcraft and demonology, and all that stuff, but it didn’t work. “But you know what I found really works?” The vampire and the bartender lean closer. “Gun.”
The vampire starts to smile. “You killed the Slayer with a gun?”
“In her own back yard. Don’t underestimate science, my friends. Good old-fashioned metal meets propulsion.” Warren starts to laugh. Everyone in the bar laughs too.
“Oh, man, this is going to be good,” says the bartender.
“The best!” says Warren. “The town is ours!”
“Ours, maybe,” says the vampire. “You are screwed.”
The vampires and demons laugh even louder. Warren figures out that they aren’t laughing with him. “This isn’t…the evil laugh of victory, is it?”
“More like the evil laugh of ‘you’re a dead man.’” says the vampire. It laughs some more.
“Okay, uh…wh-what’s the joke?” asks Warren.
“It was just on the news,” says the bartender. “Girl was shot. In her back yard. She survived. She’s in the hospital.” He chuckles. “And Slayers heal fast. Real fast.”
“Yeah,” says the vampire. “I was going to eat you myself during the commercial, but now I think it’ll be more fun to let the Slayer de-gut you. Might want to get a head start, my friend, ’cause this girl’s going to be coming for you…big-time.”
The Magic Box door crashes open. Willow walks through it. Light bulbs explode as she passes them. She’s there for the Black Arts books.
Anya comes out from behind the counter “Willow… Something terrible has happened, I know, but you don’t have to—”
“I need power,” says Willow.
Anya starts toward Willow. “Not with those books. I can’t let you.”
Willow looks up toward the loft.
“Willow!” says Anya.
“Stop!” Willow fires a blast of black lightning at Anya, freezing her in her tracks.
All the books from the loft start to fly from the shelves, down onto the research table. Willow steps up to the table and places her hands on the open pages of a book. Her hands sink into it. The words from the pages start to flow into her hands and up along her arms. Willow sucks the books empty, the words flowing across all of her skin. Willow’s eyes and hair turn black.
Willow removes her hands from the blank books on the table. “That’s better.”
Dawn is a little surprised to find the front door open when she arrives home. She enters the house, and calls out for Buffy. She doesn’t get any answer.
Dawn leaves her jacket and bag by the door and goes upstairs. She sees that the door to Willow’s room is open. She goes in. “Uh, the door was…” She sees the feet of someone lying on the floor. Most of the body is concealed by the bed. She steps farther into the room. “Tara?”
Dawn takes another step, and sees the bloody hole in Tara’s chest. Everything goes white.
Rack steps into his waiting room and asks who’s next. Warren rushes ahead of the others waiting there, and says he is. Rack doesn’t recognise him.
Warren waves a wad of cash. “Yeah. I come bearing dead presidents, so you think we can just skip the small talk?”
Rack shows Warren into his sanctum, and asks how Warren found him. Warren paid one of Rack’s customers twenty bucks for the information. Rack thinks he was overcharged. Most of his customers would have sold that information for five.
Warren does not have time for haggling. “Look, I’m in a bit of a situation here. I tried to do us all a favour and eliminate the Slayer but…it…I guess it didn’t take.”
“Killing a Slayer, that’s big business for a kid,” says Rack.
“I’m not a kid,” says Warren.
Rack gives him a look. “Okay.”
“I have my own guys,” says Warren. “The Trio. Yeah, you’ve heard of us.”
“Right,” says Rack. “What were ya, a band or something?”
Warren thought that word got around in the underworld, but Rack hasn’t heard of him, or his robots, or the freeze ray, or anything. “Sorry. So why aren’t your guys helping you?”
“Look, I thought this was a cash for a service gig, not an interview process,” says Warren. “I need protection! I’ve got the Slayer after me!”
Rack informs Warren that the Slayer is the least of his problems. He really should be worrying about the witch.
“Witch?” asks Warren. “Which witch?”
“Willow,” says Rack. “Slayer’s pal. She’s the new power, man. Anybody with intuition can feel it. She’s going to blow this town apart…starting with you.”
“Me?” asks Warren. “What did I— what did I do to her? Oh, okay. Okay. I sh—I shot her friend.”
“I feel death,” says Rack.
“But the Slayer’s alive, and she heals!”
“Yeah, she might, but somebody is stone cold, and that is why the witch wants your head.” Rack closes his eyes and shakes his head. “She can sense your essence right now, man. It’s just a matter of time before she finds you.”
Warren hands Rack his wad of cash, and tells him he can get more. Rack has to help him. Rack wants to know if Warren plans to hide, or fight. Warren plans to do both. He has a few tricks of his own, but he needs more.
“I can’t guarantee anything, not this time,” says Rack. “Girl’s running on pure fury. I’ve never felt anything like it.”
“Thank you for the tip, Nostradamus,” says Warren. “Just load me up, okay?”
Xander watches through the window of the emergency room while a surgical team works on Buffy. It is not going well.
The lights start to flicker, and they all look around. “What’s happening?” asks a nurse.
Willow appears in the room. “Leave!” she tells them. She has finally changed out of her bloody white blouse, and is dressed all in black, matching her hair and eyes. “Now!”
The surgical team all leaves.
Xander comes into the room, and asks Willow what she’s doing. “She’s going to die!”
“No, she isn’t.” Willow stands over the unconscious Buffy, and stares at the bullet wound. The bullet rises up out of Buffy’s chest, and Buffy’s wound heals.
Willow looks at the bullet floating in the air in front of her. “It’s so small.” She reaches out and closes her hand around it. When she opens her hand again, the bullet is gone.
Buffy stirs on the table, and wakes up. “What happened?” She sits up.
“Buffy! Oh, my god, are you okay?” asks Xander.
“Sure.” Buffy looks around the emergency room. “How’d I get here?”
Xander grabs Buffy in a hug. “You got to stop doing this. This dying thing’s funny once, maybe twice.”
Buffy looks around and sees Willow. “Willow?”
“Buffy.” Willow’s eyes are back to normal, and she almost smiles. “Hey.”
“What’s wrong?” asks Buffy.
“I’ll explain,” says Willow. “But we’ve got to go.”
“Why?” asks Buffy.
Willow is already on her way out the door. “It’s time to find Warren.”
Warren is at the bus depot, buying him self a ticket to San Diego. He’s planning on leaving the country.
Xander’s car speeds down a desert highway. Xander is driving, with Buffy riding shotgun. Willow sits in the middle of the back seat. She tells Xander to drive faster. When he doesn’t, she magically pushes the accelerator pedal to the floor.
“Will, would you cut that out?” says Xander. “If you wanted to drive—”
Buffy turns to look back at her. “Will, we need to stop. I don’t like this.”
Willow doesn’t plan on stopping. They’re close to Warren. She can feel him. Buffy is all for catching Warren too, but she doesn’t like that Willow is using magic to do it.
“If I wasn’t, you’d be dead,” says Willow.
“Maybe,” says Buffy. “But this isn’t right. This isn’t how I want it.”
“Sometimes you don’t have a choice,” says Willow.
Xander really thinks that Buffy should be the one who gets to make this choice. She’s the one who got shot. “You made the decision to stop for a reason. You promised us. And can I just ask? What’s with the makeover of the damned? I mean, the hair…”
Willow suddenly tells Xander to turn right. He looks, but there’s no road or anything. “Turn!” says Willow, and the steering wheel spins out of Xander’s hands. The car swerves off the road, and across the desert.
Xander gives up trying to drive “Fine, fine. Puppetmaster wants to drive? Go right ahead!”
The car comes to a halt on the shoulder of another highway. Willow gets out, and walks out into the middle of the road.
Buffy and Xander follow her. “Willow, wait!” says Buffy.
Willow freezes them in their tracks with a blast of black lightning. “Stay back!”
Willow stands in the middle of the road, looking at the bus that’s coming toward her.
The bus driver sees the girl standing in the highway, and takes his foot off the gas to slow down. The gas pedal pushes itself to the floor, and the bus continues to rush toward her. He tries to steer around her, but the steering wheel won’t turn.
Willow stands motionless in the road while the bus speeds toward her. She locks its brakes and all the bus passengers are thrown forward in their seats as the bus comes to a stop inches in front of her.
Willow steps around to the side of the bus. The door opens. “Get out.”
Warren gets out of his seat, unable to resist her command, and gets off the bus. Willow grabs him by the throat. “Please— I’ll—I’ll do anything.”
Willow squeezes Warren’s throat. His eyes start to bulge. One of Warren’s eyes pops right out of its socket, accompanied by a shower of sparks.
Willow drops Warren to the ground, momentarily stunned. “It’s a robot.” She doesn’t really believe it. “I could feel his essence.” Buffy and Xander are released from her hold on them and rush toward her.
“He tricked me.” Willow’s resolve returns. “We’ll find him another way.”
“And then what?” asks Buffy.
Willow starts to walk back toward the car. “Then we’ll kill him.”
Buffy grabs Willow’s arm. “Okay, you need to calm down. You’re angry. I—I am, too. There’s no excuse for what Warren did, but that—”
“He shot Tara,” says Willow. “When he shot you, he hit her, too. Upstairs in my room.”
Buffy is stunned. “Oh my god.” she whispers.
“Guess the last shot was the charm,” says Willow.
“She’s dead?” asks Xander.
“She’s dead. Now he’s dead, too.”
“Christ, Will, how come you didn’t say anything?” asks Xander.
Willow turns back toward the car. “I’m busy.”
Buffy follows her. “Willow, please, just stop. We love you, and Tara. But we don’t kill humans. It’s not the way.”
“How can you say that?” asks Willow. “Tara is dead.”
“I know. I know. And I…can’t understand anything… Not what happened and—and not what you must be going through. Willow, if you do this, you let Warren destroy you, too.”
“You said it yourself, Will,” says Xander. “The magic’s too strong. There’s no coming back from it.”
“I’m not coming back,” says Willow.
Buffy grabs Willow’s arm again. “Will, please, please, we’ll get through this together!”
Willow pulls away. “We won’t. Not your way.”
“Please just—”
“No!” Willow knocks Buffy and Xander to the ground with a blast of power. “No more talking! It’s done.” When they look up, she’s gone.
The sun has set when Xander and Buffy arrive back at Buffy’s house. The front door is still open. They go in, and call out for Willow and Dawn. They get no answer. Xander suggests that maybe Dawn went to look for Buffy at the hospital, but Buffy doesn’t think that’s likely. They left there hours ago. If Dawn had done that, she should be back by now. After a quick look around the ground floor, they go upstairs.
Buffy checks Dawn’s room, while Xander checks Buffy’s. They are both empty. Buffy looks through the open door into Willow’s darkened room. She slowly goes into it. She sees Tara’s body lying on the floor at the food of the bed. “Oh, god.”
“I didn’t…want to leave her alone.”
Buffy turns quickly, and sees Dawn sitting huddled against the wall. Buffy goes to Dawn and kneels beside her. She tries to get her to get to her feet. “Come on. Honey, we need to get out of here, okay?” Dawn doesn’t seem to be able to move. “Dawn, sweetheart…be strong for me, okay? Dawn, we need— we need to go downstairs.”
“I don’t understand,” says Dawn.
Buffy hugs her sister. “I don’t understand either.”
Buffy and Dawn sit together on the sofa in the living room. Buffy has changed out of her bloody shirt.
Two men from the coroner’s office carry the gurney with Tara’s body on it down the stairs. Xander accompanies them to the front door. One of the men gives Xander a clipboard with a form to sign. He gives Xander a copy, and tells him to call in the morning for more information.
Xander goes into the living room. “That’s it,” he tells Buffy and Dawn.
“Are the police gone, too?” asks Buffy.
Xander sits down on the coffee table facing them. “Coming back tomorrow with more of their pretty yellow tape.”
“We need to find Willow,” says Buffy
“Yeah. She’s off the wagon big-time.” Xander sighs. “Warren’s a dead man if she finds him.”
“Good!” says Dawn.
Buffy looks at her sister. “Dawn, don’t say that.”
“Why not?” asks Dawn. “I’d do it myself if I could.”
“Because you don’t really feel that way.”
“Yes, I do,” says Dawn. “And you should, too. He killed Tara and he nearly killed you. He needs to pay.”
“Out of the mouths of babes,” says Xander.
Buffy gives him a sharp look. “Xander!”
“I’m just saying he’s…he’s just as bad as any vampire you send to dustville.”
“Being a Slayer doesn’t give me a license to kill. Warren’s human.”
“So?” asks Dawn.
“So the human world has its own rules for dealing with people like him.”
“Yeah, we all know how well those rules work,” says Xander.
“Sometimes they do,” says Buffy. “Sometimes they don’t. We can’t control the universe. If we were supposed to…then the magic wouldn’t change Willow the way it does. And…we’d be able to bring Tara back.”
“And Mom,” says Dawn softly.
“There are limits to what we can do,” says Buffy. “There should be. Willow doesn’t want to believe that, and now she’s messing with forces that want to hurt her. All of us.”
“I just…” Xander looks at his hands. “I’ve had blood on my hands all day. Blood from people I love.”
“I know,” says Buffy. “And now it has to stop. Warren’s going to get what he deserves, I promise. But I will not let Willow destroy herself.”
Xander asks where they should start looking, Willow could be anywhere. Buffy suggests that they go to the Magic Box for some sort of locating spell. She looks at Xander. “I could go myself.”
“No, no, no. I’m cool. I’ll go,” says Xander.
Buffy doesn’t want to leave Dawn alone. Dawn wants to come with them, but Buffy doesn’t like that idea either. This is going to be too dangerous.
“But, it’s Willow,” says Dawn. “She needs us.”
“She does,” says Buffy. “And you’ll help her. Lots. But first we have to get her home in one piece.” Dawn tries to object, but Buffy has made up her mind. “Dawn, I’m serious. You’ve been through enough for more than one— ever. You should be someplace where you feel safe.”
Dawn sulks. “Fine. I want to go to Spike’s.”
Buffy considers that for a moment, and sighs. “All right.”
“What?” asks Xander. “Not all right. Are you kidding? After what Spike did—”
“Xander!” Buffy gives him a tiny shake of her head. She doesn’t want Dawn to know about that. “I’ll get the coats.”
Buffy goes into the foyer. Xander follows her. “You’re not going to really leave Dawn with Mr. Attempted Rape?”
“He won’t hurt Dawn, okay?” says Buffy. “He physically can’t. Besides, he wouldn’t.” Xander is much less sure than Buffy about what Spike is capable of, but Buffy doesn’t want to argue with him. “Dawn feels safe with him. We don’t have a choice. Right now, he’s all we’ve got.”
Willow lays her bloody blouse down on the floor of Tara’s dorm room, front down. She kneels beside it. “Blood of the slain, hear me. Guide me to Tara’s killer.”
The blood from the front of the blouse seeps through into the back, forming a map of Sunnydale. A point of light glows in the woods on the outskirts of town.
Meet John Doe is playing on the TV in Spike’s crypt when Buffy and Dawn enter it. “Spike?” calls out Buffy.
Clem starts upright in the chair, scattering chips. “Suffering cats! Where did you come from?”
Buffy is surprised to see Clem, and apologises for startling him, and making him spill his snacks. Clem says that’s okay, and waves “Hi” to Dawn. He asks if he can get them anything. Buffy tells him they’re fine. She’s looking for Spike.
Clem is surprised that Buffy doesn’t know. “He left. Town.”
“He just took off?” asks Dawn.
That’s why Clem is there. He’s crypt sitting for Spike, making sure nothing else moves in while Spike’s away, plus, he doesn’t have a TV. He’s still surprised that Spike didn’t tell them. He offers them some snacks again.
“We’re fine, thank you,” says Buffy, Um…but you could do us a favour. Do you think maybe Dawn could hang out here with you for a while? I—I have some stuff that I need to do, and I really don’t want her to be alone.”
Dawn still wants to come with Buffy, but Buffy hasn’t changed her mind about that.
Clem says he’d love to have Dawn’s company. He asks her if she likes to play Parcheesi, or they could rent a video. “I have been dying to see The Wedding Planner.”
Dawn says she’s good with either, and Clem offers her the comfy chair.
Buffy tells Dawn she’ll be back as soon as she can, and starts to go. She pauses at the door and asks Clem if Spike said anything about when he’d be back.
“No,” says Clem. “Only that he could be gone a while.”
Spike walks through an African village, toward the entrance to a cave. A man standing guard on it tries to tell him to stop, but Spike ignores him, and keeps going.
“Stop!” says the guard, speaking in Luganda, “You’ll die! Stop!”
Spike enters the cave. As he goes deeper into it the light filtering in the entrance fades. Spike uses his lighter for illumination.
The flame from the lighter reveals several paintings on the cave walls of people being tortured, a face with its lips sown shut, a man being stabbed with a knife.
A wind blows through the cave, blowing out Spike’s lighter. “You seek me, vampire?” asks a voice from the darkness.
“You do the finger paintings?” asks Spike. “Nice work.”
The silhouette of a demon with glowing green eyes appears. “Answer me.”
“Yeah. I seek you.”
“Something about a woman,” says the demon. “The Slayer.”
“Bitch thinks she’s better than me. Ever since I got this bleeding chip in my head, things ain’t been right. Everything’s gone to hell.”
“And you want to return to your former self?”
“Yeah.”
The demon laughs. “Look what she’s reduced you to.”
“It’s this bloody chip—”
“You were a legendary dark warrior, and you let yourself be castrated, and you have the audacity to crawl in here and demand restoration?”
“I’m still a warrior,” says Spike.
“You’re a pathetic excuse for a demon.”
“Yeah? I’ll show you pathetic,” says Spike. “Gimme your best shot.”
“You’d never endure the trials required to grant your request.”
“Do your worst,” says Spike. “But when I win, I want what I came here for. Bitch is going to see a change.”
Xander helps Anya move toward the research table. She’s moving stiffly, but Willow’s spell on her is starting to wear off. She shrugs away from Xander’s touch as she sits down, and tells him that Willow sucked all the Dark Arts books dry.
“Look, Anya, something terrible happened.”
“I know,” says Anya. “Tara.”
Xander tells Anya that Willow is out for blood. They need to find her fast, before she can get to Warren. “Is there something you can do…a locator spell?”
Anya looks up at Xander. “I don’t need a spell. I can feel her.”
“You can—”
“Feel her,” says Anya. “Her thirst for vengeance…it’s overwhelming.”
“Is that, like, left over from your vengeance demon days, this sensor?”
“No.” Anya shakes her head. “Not left over.”
Xander understands what that means. “When?”
“When do you think?” asks Anya bitterly.
Buffy enters the Magic Box, and notices the tension between Anya and Xander. She asks if everyone’s okay. “Did Willow—”
“Got her power boost and took off,” says Anya.
Xander tells Buffy that Anya knows where Willow is. Buffy asks if they did a spell.
“Not exactly,” says Xander. “Seems Anya got her vengeance on again.”
“Oh…” Buffy looks at Anya.
“So, Willow’s all wrathy.” Xander looks at Anya. “Why don’t you go to her? Isn’t that your gig?”
“Normally, I’d have to, but she doesn’t want me,” says Anya.
“She wants to do it herself,” says Buffy.
“Yeah.”
“Look, Anya, we don’t have much time,” says Buffy. “Which side of this are you on?”
Anya doesn’t answer. She just looks at them.
“If you know where she is, you can help us,” says Xander.
“I’ll help.” Anya gets to her feet. “But I’m helping Willow. She’s close to him. He’s in the woods.”
Willow moves through the woods. The shrubs and brush pull aside, clearing a path for her. She enters a clearing and looks around. “Run all night, Warren. I’ll still find—”
Warren buries an axe into Willow’s back. She falls to the ground.
Warren looks at Willow lying on her face on the ground. He can’t believe that it was that easy. He’s right.
Willow rises back to her feet, and turns toward him. She reaches around behind her back and grabs the axe handle. She pulls it out of her back and holds it in front of her. “Axe, not going to cut it.” She tosses it away into the bushes.
Warren turns and runs. Willow lets him go. She walks after him.
Warren fumbles at his backpack as he runs through the woods. He pulls out a small metallic cube, about four inches on a side. He pulls a pin from the top of it and mechanical wings extend out from the sides. They start to beat rapidly, and Warren releases it.
The cube darts through the trees, searching for its target. It zooms toward Willow.
Willow sees the cube coming, and holds up her hand. “Freeze!” she says as the cube explodes. The explosion freezes, becoming a crystalline sphere that shatters when Willow touches it.
Warren runs through the woods. He stops when Willow suddenly appears in front of him.
“Ha. That’s cute. That’s a cute trick.” Warren slowly backs away from Willow. “It was an accident, you know.” He reaches into his pocket.
Willow follows him. “Oh…You mean instead of killing my best friend, you killed my girlfriend?”
“It—it— wasn’t personal. That’s all.” Warren turns and runs.
“Well, this is.” Willow sends a bolt of lightning into Warren. He falls to the ground.
Warren scrambles back to his feet, and throws the object that he pulled from his pocket at Willow. “Capture!”
A torus of gel forms around Willow’s waist, and expands to surround her entire body. Warren runs off through the woods. Willow can’t move. She tries to speak a spell, but the gel engulfing her prevents it. Her eyes start to glow. The gel melts away from them, and quickly runs away from her whole body.
Willow’s done playing with Warren. She speaks a single word spell: “Irretite!” 1
Vines wrap around Warren’s legs and arms, trapping him. They pull him spread eagle, unable to move. Willow appears in front of him. Warren tries to bluff her. “You are really asking for it, you know that?”
“I’m asking for it?”
“I’m going to walk away from this,” says Warren, “and when I do, you’re going to beg to go join your little girlfriend.”
Willow looks at Warren. “She wasn’t your first.” Warren pretends not to understand. “Tara. She wasn’t the first girl you killed.”
“I don’t know what you’re talk—”
“Reveal!” snaps Willow.
Katrina steps out of the trees. “I should have strangled you in your sleep…back when we shared a bed. I should have done the world a favour.”
Warren looks away. “It’s a trick.”
“Why, Warren?” asks Katrina. “You could have just let me go.”
Warren refuses to look toward Katrina. “Make it shut up. Make it go away.”
“It didn’t have to be like that,” says Katrina. “How could you say you loved me and do that to me?”
Warren looks toward Katrina. “Because you deserved it, bitch!” Katrina has vanished.
“Because you liked it,” says Willow.
“Oh, shut up!”
“You never felt you had the power with her, not until you killed her.”
“Women! You’re just like the rest of them— Mind games.”
“You get off on it,” says Willow. “That’s why you had a mad-on for the Slayer. She was your big ‘O’, wasn’t she, Warren?”
“Are you done yet,” asks Warren, “or can we talk some more about our feelings?”
Anya leads Buffy and Xander through the woods. She can feel that they’re getting close. Warren is still alive. Willow isn’t done with him.
“Help!” cries Warren. “Somebody! Help!”
“What’s the matter?” asks Willow. “Thought you wanted to talk.”
Warren tries to pull himself together. “No.”
“Okay. I’ll talk.” Willow holds out a closed hand and opens it. The bullet she pulled out of Buffy is in it.
“What—what are you doing?”
“Shh!” Willow gestures toward Warren, and his shirt rips open.
“Hey—I’m sorry, okay?” says Warren. “I’m sorry!”
Willow holds the bullet out in front of his chest. “Want to know what a bullet feels like, Warren? A real one? It’s not like in the comics.” She lets go, and the bullet floats in the air in front of him.
“No,” says Warren. “No.”
“I think you need to,” says Willow. “Feel it.” The bullet slowly moves toward his chest.
“Ah, god, stop it!”
The bullet touches Warren’s chest. “It’s not going to make a neat little hole,” says Willow. “First, it’ll obliterate your internal organs. Your lung will collapse. Feels like drowning.”
Warren tries to pull back. “Please, no…” The bullet starts to burrow into his chest.
“When it finally hits your spine, it’ll blow your central nervous system.
Warren cries in pain. “Oh, please, stop, god, please!”
“I’m talking!” Willow waves her hand, and Warren’s mouth is sown shut. “The pain will be unbearable, but you won’t be able to move.” Willow quirks a half smile at him. “Bullets usually travel faster than this, of course. But the dying…”
Warren tries to cry in pain.
“…it’ll seem like it takes forever. Something, isn’t it? One tiny piece of metal…destroys everything. It ripped her insides out. Took her light away. From me. From the world. Now the one person who should be here is gone, and a waste like you gets to live. Tiny piece of metal? Can you feel it now?”
Anya, Buffy and Xander have almost reached the clearing in the woods.
“I said… Can you feel it?” Willow releases the sutures binding Warren’s mouth closed.
“Please! God! I did wrong!” cries Warren. “I see that now. I need—I need— jail! I need…but you…you don’t want this! You’re not a bad person. Not like me!”
“Willow!” cries Buffy.
Warren looks toward the sound of Buffy’s voice. “Oh, and when you get caught, you’ll lose them, too. Your friends. You don’t want that. I know you’re in pain, but—”
“Bored now.” Willow waves her hand, and Warren screams as his skin is ripped away.
Anya, Buffy and Xander freeze at the sight of Warren’s skinless body hanging from the vines.
“Oh, my god,” says Xander.
“What did you do?” asks Buffy. “Willow, what did you do?”
Willow waves her hand at Warren’s body. It’s consumed in flames. “One down…” Her eyes start to glow. A whirlwind forms around her. She vanishes from the woods in a flash of lightning.
| Who or What | Where | How |
|---|---|---|
| Warren Mears | The woods | Flayed and incinerated by Willow |